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Air Serbia maintains massive growth

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Air Serbia’s passenger growth exceeds 75% in February

Air Serbia has continued to see its passenger numbers soar during February, which is traditionally the aviation industry’s slowest month of the year. The Serbian carrier welcomed 108.545 passengers on board its aircraft, an increase of 77.1% compared to the same month last year. In February, the average cabin load factor stood at 63.4%, up four points on 2013. The highest load factor was recorded on flights from Belgrade to Paris, Sarajevo to Belgrade and Belgrade to London. So far this year, the Serbian carrier handled 235.977 passengers, up 69.5% on the same period last year. Overall, Air Serbia accounted for 46.7% of all passengers passing through Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport last month, a significant boost compared to 2013.

Month

PAX

Change (%)

JAN

127.432

▲ 63.5

FEB

108.545

▲ 77.1

Last February, Jat Airways was forced to cut down on its frequencies and routes due to a fleet shortage. The number of operated flights decreased by 9% compared to February 2012. However, last month’s results represent a major improvement when compared to the past few years as well. Jat’s passenger numbers continued to decline until July 2013. Figures again dipped from September until Air Serbia’s launch in late October.

As the 2014 summer season approaches at the end of the month, Air Serbia will launch two new routes - Budapest and Sofia. Several destinations will also see a significant boost in frequencies. As EX-YU Aviation News learns, flights to Varna, which were to launch on March 30, have been postponed by a month. The service will now be inaugurated on May Day and will run three times per week before increasing to daily on June 16. The airline is expected to announce the new launch date soon. Previously, the airline moved the launch of its Beirut service from late March to June 1. Services to Warsaw and Kiev will be inaugurated on May 29.

Comments

Load factor is still not great, but at least this should shut up all those trolls!

Air Serbia is becoming a very good airline. Look at all these positive reviews on Skytrax:

http://www.airlinequality.com/Forum/jat.htm

For the past two months, there have been nothing but great reviews, with every reviewer recommending the airline! This is great news. I posted some of the highlights:

4 March 2014 by A White (UK)I've flown with JAT (what Air Serbia used to be called). It was a very basic experience to put it mildly. I was flying from London Heathrow to Belgrade yesterday. A great experience, there are some bugs to iron out but this isn't first class, it's biz class. Firstly, the seats were new - they reclined back and the foot part lifted up. You got a big pillow for your back or head and a blanket. We had two stewardesses between 6 of us but I think that is because one of them was training the other. Both women were very friendly and attentive and offered refills throughout the 2hrs 45min flight. The food. Well, anyone who has flown with JAT will know the food was something you literally did not bother with. It was sub par. Now I had a 3 course meal with a choice of wines and champagne (or local Serbian brandy if I wanted). The meal was delicious - it was well presented and hot and not overcooked. It was served with fresh bread rolls. I am fussy with things and I couldn't fault it. The cabin was clean. The cutlery was metal. I was offered an iPad but I had my own tablet to watch a film on. A very positive experience indeed.

13 February 2014 by Alex Boddroz (Egypt)JU 311, 12 Dec and JU 314, to Paris on 15 Dec. Friendly and professional crew, very comfortable seats, plenty of leg room, stylish pillows and blankets, excellent selection of wine and drinks and delicious meal. When the flight attendant handed me the menu, I thought there must be a fee attached. I got a hot meal free. Excellent experience. On a way back was the same. I came to Belgrade airport, ground support staff were smiling, professional and accommodating. On the flight back, the same good service and experience. Have just bought another ticket with Air Serbia to Thessaloniki!

I'm flying every week at least once with AirSerbia and can say they really improved since the take over. Especially on the flights the planes, treatment, service and food.

Currently from my perspective following things are making problems1. every time there is a long queue at economic check-in on Friday's afternoon. They need to make this faster AND they need a online check-in. For me it is not acceptable to wait every week so long in the queue.This worries me especially for summer.

2. The last flights seem to me mostly a bit delayed, I suppose this is because they have a tight schedule during the day and every small delay sums up at the end of the day.

This is good LF if we take into consideration that previously Jat Airways had a year average LF of about 55-69% and this is almost like that % in February alone. I can not wait to see the summer months. Best regards from Frankfurt.

Service will start in 2.5 months from now. Both LOT and Air Serbia can make changes to fares and frequency as we get into summer season. Once summer is over, I expect LOT to drop off and codeshare with JU, similar to what happened on BEG-LJU route but not as quickly.

with those 5 we should be happy for now - It is 15 daily rotations. I think if they see that thay lack one, they can e.g. put Boing or A319 to Prague and Tivat (in season, that would be realistic) and they will have more ATR rotations. JU have enough organization worries besides ATRs; I hope they will successfully put in operation all those A319/320 and new routes. And probably in March 2015 we will see a few new ATRs with more accent on local expansion (Croatia, Albania). For now, I am pretty satisfied as the thing goes on.

Dear MD, should you be more shrewd you'd figure that the number of operational seats offered is exactly what I'm interested in. But obviously I'll be left without answer which again raises my eyebrows on the accuracy of these CLF numbers. Nevertheless, JAT CLF is still far beyond say WZZ. On the other hand, the incoming moths shall show how many carriers will JAT and state drive off from BEG.

Banja Luka is the only destination that is either doing meh or bad.Brussels and Stockholm have been performing really nicely lately. From the top of my head, the average load for both routes is around 70%. Connecting passengers are also on the rise. For example, this evening, 48% of all booked passengers were connecting ones.

Interestingly enough, Air Serbia started selling tickets to North America via its website. From what I could see they are cooperating with Virgin Atlantic and Air Berlin. The former being much cheaper.

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